Chapter 10

Carl's group infiltrates the Town Hall during a heat wave to investigate, discovering the guards are Changeling Principals in disguise. After a chaotic combat with guards and alarms raised, Carl finds a imprisoned gnome named Wynne in a hidden chamber below—but crawlers from the subterranean zone kill him before Carl can free him, failing the quest and complicating their escape.

As two suns rise and temperatures climb, Carl and his team scout the Town Hall, finding it heavily guarded with Level 48 dromedarian guards inside. When Katia reports a shift change approaching, they proceed with the "frog plan," using Firas's Puddle Jumper spell to reach a second-floor balcony. After Donut breaches a locked security door with her Hole spell, they navigate to a fortified door where Carl uses sparklers to distract two guard changelings, allowing Louis to deploy a smoke cloud. The guards are revealed to be Changeling Principals—shapeshifters seeking rare creatures for their collections—rather than true camels. Carl kills both after intense combat. Behind the fortified door, Carl discovers a trapdoor leading to a hidden chamber containing a map of the Necropolis of Anser and shriveled mushrooms. Descending, he finds an elderly gnome named Wynne chained beyond a quadrant boundary, being drugged by the dromedarians as a hostage guarantee of peace. A quest updates: Free Wynne from his bondage. Before Carl can act, five crawlers from the subterranean zone emerge—including Low Thi, Tyler Storm, Morris Sp, and Mike Barnes 3—who have been searching for the missing map. Wynne, confused about Carl's identity and desperate, begs the crawlers to kill him so they can access his knowledge of a temple. Low Thi kills Wynne with a spear thrust, completing an achievement called Cockblock and failing Carl's quest. Carl, furious, demands the crawlers meet him at the Desperado Club in an hour so he can transcribe their map and 'kick their goddamn ass.'